


ghosting through life

by Thealmostrhetoricalquestion



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Astral Projection, Chubby Neville, Fluff, Healing, M/M, Minor Self-esteem Issues, Post-Battle of Hogwarts, Secret Identity, mostly fluffy though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-11
Updated: 2018-02-11
Packaged: 2019-03-16 22:40:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13645914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thealmostrhetoricalquestion/pseuds/Thealmostrhetoricalquestion
Summary: Neville's speciality has always been in simple magic. Simple, sweet spells that make living a little easier.He doesn’t need a wand to make his clothes more stretchy, warmer, to turn the blankets in his cupboards into the softest, feathery fabric. He’s never told anyone that he can make the jam spread itself on his toast without a word. He’s never felt the need to. Real charms, the big stuff, he tells himself, are the kind that you should be proud of. This is just stuff that makes the world feel kinder.





	ghosting through life

**Author's Note:**

> Ahh, I hope you like this! I loved writing chubby Neville, although it's a little subtler than what I originally wanted to write. Thanl you to the lovely people for putting this together, it was so much fun :)

He might have grown into his ears, but he hasn’t fully gotten comfortable in his skin yet. He feels most at home in the greenhouses at Hogwarts, and as the war settles down and the battle fades away, that’s where Neville finds himself. He walks slowly through the crushed plants and broken pots, making mental lists of the things that need repairing and buying and transfiguring. Some of it can be salvaged, but most of it was ruined in the battle, and with the new school year looming ahead, someone needs to make sure the greenhouses are safe for the students to use. What if there’s a kid just like Neville, who finds comfort in good, clean earth and plants that listen to their troubles, a kid who’s lonely or even just lonesome, someone who needs somewhere safe to go to when things get a little too much? What if there’s a kid just like Neville, who doesn’t find a home at Hogwarts, all because of a war that should have been over years ago?

Neville rolls up his sleeves and gets to work. 

He spends hours a day with his hands buried in soil, his wand tucked behind his ear. It occasionally sets fire to the back of his hair, but after so many years of rooming with Seamus Finnegan, Neville’s actually gotten pretty good at putting out fires. He never feels too big here, like he’s taking up more room than he’s worth. He wears out his dragon-hide gloves to the point where there are holes in each finger and makes a mental note to buy some new stronger ones. He borrows Professor Sprout’s pink flowery ones for the time being. 

Professor Sprout orders new plants, and they arrive in large crates over the next few weeks, piling up outside the greenhouses. Neville oversees the deliveries, checking each crate for breakages or, worse, slugs, while Professor Sprout repairs the greenhouse roof. It takes half an hour and a plate of scones, but eventually everything is settled in its rightful place, and all that’s left to do is plant and clean. 

Neville is halfway through settling a mandrake into its pot, earmuffs firmly in place, when the Venemous Tentacula, which somehow survived the roof caving in without a single scratch, rears up and bites his hand. One of the spines pierces the skin, and Neville cries out and jerks back, cradling his wrist protectively. 

Professor Sprout tuts and takes his hand, examining the skin around the bite, which is already purple and blotchy. 

“Better get to the hospital wing, Neville,” she says, ushering him out of the door and shooing him towards the castle. “Don’t worry dear, everything will still be standing when you get back. It’s about time you took a break anyway.” 

Neville sighs and begins the trek up to the castle, his wrist throbbing intermittently. 

The repairs are coming along well. The walls are mostly intact, and the big spots of rubble have been cleared away, leaving only small things left to repair, like a faulty corridor or the hidden stairways that always like to trick Neville into being late. He spots groups of students, all in Muggle clothing, working on sections of walls and uprooted flooring, their wands raised aloft. Some are simply huddled together, talking quietly, the occasional burst of laughter ringing through the halls. There’s an air of lightness to the castle, but the signs of despair are still littering the ground. 

Neville pushes open the door to the hospital wing and comes face to face with most of the Weasley family. His eyes widen, and he backs into the wall, but luckily, they don’t see him. Neville’s seen Ron a few times, wandering the halls with Hermione, working on bits of the castle together, but he’s steered clear. He knows the Weasley’s are a tight-knit family, full of laughter and love, and he knows they just suffered a great loss, and he doesn’t want to get in the way or impose on them. He feels like he might accidentally blurt out something ridiculous about Fred, or worse, offer something that falls short, like his sympathies. 

He skirts around the edge of the room, avoiding the beds full of sleeping patients, and the one with the Weasley family gathered around it. He knocks quietly on Madam Pomfrey’s door, and she appears with a harassed look on her face, sighing exasperatedly when he holds up his swollen hand with a sheepish smile. 

“I’m going to have a bed made specifically for you, Mr Longbottom,” she warns him. “With a little plaque at the end, so we know who it belongs to.”

Neville lets himself be ushered into a bed. The Weasley’s have filed out sometime during their conversation, leaving one ginger man in the bed next to him. Neville vaguely recognises him, and he remembers sneaking out one night during his first year, watching a dragon fly away on a broom. This must be Charlie, then. He has a wrap around his head, which is thankfully clean of blood, and his arm positioned awkwardly at his side. Neville watches him subtly out of the corner of his eye while Madam Pomfrey tips a potion down his throat and prods his hand with her wand. 

“It doesn’t look too bad,” she says. “The potion will counteract the venom, and the swelling should go down within an hour, so I suggest you make yourself comfortable for a bit.” 

“I could just go back to the greenhouse,” Neville suggests. “I’m sure you need the bed.” 

Madam Pomfrey gives his hand one last tap, which stings a bit, and rolls her eyes. “Nonsense. Stay here and I’ll have the elves bring you some tea in a moment. No wandering off, now.”

She bustles off, leaving Neville staring mournfully at his hand, which is now stuck in an upright position. He heaves a big sigh and leans back against the cushions. 

“It can’t be all that bad.”

Startled, Neville turns to look at Charlie, who’s arching an eyebrow in his direction. He has a tired look on his handsome face, the top part of which is mostly obscured by the wrap. 

“It’s not, really,” Neville offers awkwardly. “I’d just rather be in the greenhouses. What about you?”

“Hmm?” Charlie’s confused expression clears, and he jerks a thumb at his head. “Oh, this? Just a minor head wound. I’ve had worse at work.” 

“I just thought, since all your family was here…” Neville trails off, listening the usual niggling voice in the back of his head telling him to stop talking, to stay quiet. He’s gotten better at ignoring it lately, especially over the last year, but something about all of this has him biting back his old stutter. 

“Yeah, well, they’ve been a bit on edge, ever since…” Charlie swallows, his face tightening with grief. It’s such an intense, private expression that Neville has to look away. He focuses on a loose paving stone while Charlie swallows and takes a deep breath. “Hey, how’d you know they were my family?” 

Neville isn’t so shy that he can stop the dry look from popping up on his face. Charlie gives a little rueful chuckle, and shrugs one shoulder. 

“Yeah, guess we can’t really get away with subtlety, can we? The hair is a dead giveaway.”

“And the freckles. I did room with Ron for six years, too,” Neville allows. “I’ve gotten pretty good at spotting a Weasley.” 

Charlie peers at him curiously. “You’re not the Irish one, and you’re not Dean, so you must be… Neville? Didn’t you kill Nagini with a sword?”

Neville blushes. 

“Yeah, that’s me,” he mumbles, fiddling with the quilt cover. Truthfully, he doesn’t really feel like he deserves all of the praise heaped on him for what he did. In the moment, he felt powerful and strong and like a hero, but in the light of day, after watching Harry defeat Voldemort, the darkest wizard of all time, after watching the dead laid to rest and the wounded suffering and those left behind in tears, well… it puts some things into perspective. 

“Sorry,” Charlie says, when the silence stretches on a bit. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. Harry told us about what you did, what it meant. You helped save a lot of people, Neville. I can’t help but be impressed by that.” 

But the truth is, Neville doesn’t know what it meant, to kill the snake. Harry never told him. And he doesn’t begrudge Harry that, because he had an awful lot on his mind at the time, but all Neville did was follow orders, do a friend a favour. It doesn’t feel like he saved anyone, except maybe Ron and Hermione. 

“I guess,” he says lightly, and Charlie narrows his eyes at him, but doesn’t press it. Neville slips out of bed as soon as Madam Pomfrey bustles away, gives a half-wave to Charlie, who looks like he wants to protest, and makes his way to the greenhouse.

*

Neville moves out sometime in the Spring. It’s a good time for moving, his grandmother says stoically, as she flicks her wand at his various belongings, watching them unpack and find their way onto shelves and into drawers and under beds. It’s a time for new beginnings, for growth and new life. Spring has always been Neville’s favourite season, for all that it means a lot of hard work when it comes to his plants, so he moves in the spring and waves goodbye to his grandmother from the front porch. She disapparates in the early hours of the morning, when mist is still low on the ground and the air is cool with the scent of dew and coming rain.

He worries, a little, that Augusta will be lonely. But his grandmother has always been a strong, no-nonsense sort of woman, and Neville is eighteen now, so it makes sense to leave. It just leaves a little well of sadness in his stomach, at the thought of abandoning his grandmother in a big old house, the house his father had loved. 

The house he gets isn’t the fanciest house. All the rooms are on one floor, and it only has the one bedroom, and the bathroom is more of a closet. The tap leaks and there’s a creaky floorboard by his bed, and the window at the back won’t shut properly, so when the wind blows through, the house turns freezing. Neville loves it. It’s his own space, and he can make it what he wants. 

The garden is huge, and he already has an order of planters on the way, ready to be filled and turned and watered. There are trees blanketing the back of his plot, apples and pears yellowing in the thick leaves, and there are bushes to be pruned and shrubbery to replant and weeds to dig up. There’s a big porch out the front of the house, and Neville stands there in the mornings, leaning against the railing in an old grey jumper and a pair of worn jogging bottoms. He wriggles his bare toes against the dusty beams, slightly warm from the pale sun, and looks out at the street. 

Ottery St. Catchpole is quiet at this time in the morning, kids making their way to school along the dirt lane down past the last few houses. A few people are jogging towards the park that sits a little way away from Neville’s house, out past the river behind his plot of land. They have strange little buds in their ears connected to strings, and when they jog past his house, Neville can hear music. 

The mug in his hands heats his skin, curls of steam rising up and sketching feathers in the air. The feathers turn into doves, which take flight, the vapour vanishing after a few moments. He doesn’t have to whisper to get the steam to move, doesn’t have to raise a finger. 

His speciality has always been in simple magic. Simple, sweet spells that make living a little easier. He doesn’t need a wand to make his clothes more stretchy, warmer, to turn the blankets in his cupboards into the softest, feathery fabric. He’s never told anyone that he can make the jam spread itself on his toast without a word. He’s never felt the need to. Real charms, the big stuff, he tells himself, are the kind that you should be proud of. This is just stuff that makes the world feel kinder. 

He collects things, too. He collects laughter and sounds and flavours and textures, and he uses his magic to keep it all safe and snug. He doesn’t know anyone else who does that, but he doesn’t mind being odd, not for this. 

His planters arrive a few days after he moves in, brought by several owls. Neville feeds them biscuits out of the packet on his kitchen table while he carefully peels away the paper and enlarges the planters. Then he curses himself for not moving them outside first, but he’s trying not to draw attention to himself, not with all the Muggles around. Owls are discreet enough, when they want to be, but enlarging things in broad daylight is another matter entirely. 

He spends most of the morning shifting the planters outside, waving intermittently at his neighbours, who stride past on their way to the gym and college and work. The soil is easy to work with, fresh and soil and pliable. He works the first seeds down into the earth with dirty, bitten finger-nails, and then cleans them with a whisper. Watering fills him with a kind of peace, and Neville stands in his garden, watching the first buds of life take root, and smiles. 

*

Mrs Weasley proffers the pie with a determined expression, and Neville takes it in a daze. He still has a toothbrush hanging out of his mouth, and he’s wearing his pyjamas with the ducks all over the bottom half, and Mrs Weasley is at the door. 

“Uh,” Neville says, somewhat garbled by the toothbrush, and Mrs Weasley smiles tiredly. He steps back hurriedly to let her in, and then trips into the bathroom to wash his mouth out. He puts the toothbrush back into the little pot beside the sink and glances in the mirror, wincing at the dark circles beneath his eyes. It’s still not easy, sleeping after the war. He’s been getting better, slowly but surely, but it’s not easy. 

His magic makes it a little easier. He feels warmth flood him from head to toe, and it’s like being swaddled by a blanket. His lip twitches up, and he washes his face off quickly before going to find Mrs Weasley. He pauses in the entrance to the kitchen, which doubles as a living room as well, when he spots Mrs Weasley standing at the corkboard on the far wall. Dread takes root in his stomach, and he steps forward carefully. 

There’s a photograph pinned to the corkboard. It’s of the whole DA. Fred’s face grins out of the paper, one arm wrapped around George, his eyes alight with happiness. Mrs Weasley’s hand drifts up to touch the picture and then darts away just as quickly. She wipes her eyes on her sleeve, and Neville feels awkward. He doesn’t know what to say. There are lots of things he wants to say, about how Fred was a light in Hogwarts that could never go out, about how he brightened so many lives, about how funny he was, how he made people like Neville feel like there was a place for them within the school walls, simply by including him. But grief has an awful way of building barriers between people. 

“He turned me into a canary once,” Neville says instead, and Mrs Weasley chuckles a little wetly. 

“He was good at that.” 

“He was,” Neville says. “I haven’t been able to trust custard creams since.”

Mrs Weasley chuckles again, and they stand in silence for a little while. Watching Fred laugh in the picture. Then Neville offers her a cup of tea, and they sit for a bit while the kettle boils, and Neville cuts the pie without lifting a finger. If Mrs Weasley notices the lack of a wand when a piece floats towards her on a plate, she doesn’t say anything. She simply picks up her fork and takes a bite while the tea steeps on the counter. 

Neville takes a bite of his own pie and says, “It’s good,” and means it. The filling is deliciously sweet, and the pastry is nice and flaky, just the way he likes it. 

“I expect you’re wondering why I just showed up like this,” Mrs Weasley says, when the plates sit empty in front of them. She takes a sip of her tea and then stirs in a second sugar. “Truthfully, I don’t know. I heard there was a new neighbour not far from us, and then Miss Lovegood told us it was you when she came to visit the other day.”

Neville doesn’t know how Luna knows, considering he hasn’t told her yet, but frankly he isn’t surprised. He listens to Mrs Weasley talk and talk for a while, and he wonders how quiet the Burrow must be right now, stifled by grief, and he decides to simply let her talk. He adds a few things, speaks when she asks a question, but mostly he lets her talk. 

“Listen to me, rambling away,” she says, gathering up her cup and taking it to the sink before Neville can move. “I heard from Professor Sprout that you can do wonderful things with a garden.” 

Neville flushes slightly. “I like gardening a lot. It helps me think.”

Mrs Weasley turns around with a soft, understanding smile on her face. “I feel the same way about cooking. Goodness, the house must be bursting with pie and cake and casserole at the moment. Anyway, I was going to say, if ever you feel like working on something, our garden could use a bit of help. It was ruined, in the battle at Bill’s wedding, and I haven’t quite gotten around to fixing it up properly.”

She looks so anxious to offer him something, that Neville doesn’t think twice before agreeing. 

“That would be lovely, Mrs Weasley.”

Mrs Weasley beams.

*

“Neville?” 

Neville hums something back, waving a hand over his shoulder as he works diligently at a tricky knot of weeds. He untangles it eventually, coaxing it up from the ground without disturbing the soil too much, and places it in the plastic bucket beside him, which immediately belches. Then he turns, and comes face-to-face with Ron and Harry. There are more of the Weasley’s hovering behind them, chatting quietly and arranging a table on the lawn, but they aren’t paying Neville any attention. Ron and Harry, however, look bewildered. 

“No offence, mate, but what are you doing in my mum’s garden?” Ron says, although he doesn’t look annoyed so much as confused. 

“She invited me,” Neville says, standing up and brushing off his hands. “Apparently there was a fight after a wedding here, and the garden was ruined. Mrs Weasley saw what I’d done to the greenhouses at Hogwarts and wondered if I could help out here. I didn’t realise how late it had gotten though. I should probably get out of your hair.”

“Nonsense,” Mrs Weasley says, bustling over and taking the bucket away from Neville, who startles slightly in the face of her brisk tone. “You can stay for dinner, Neville. There’s plenty to go around, and it’s late. I don’t want you wandering around by yourself at this hour.” 

“That’s not…” he trails off as Mrs Weasley strides off, bucket in hand, to rearrange the tablecloth. 

Ron grins at him. “No point arguing, mate. Might as well give in right away. You might want to wash your hands before Mum sees, though.” 

Neville glances down at the dirt wedged deep beneath his fingernails and nods, point taken. He sidles past Ron and Harry, who head off to the table, and ducks into the kitchen, wiping his boots off on the welcome mat, which wipes itself clean. The water is warm against his skin, and he’s just about to reach for the soap when a deep, warm voice interrupts his careful scrubbing. 

“Neville? Is that you?” 

He jerks around, hands still safely under the spray, and Charlie smiles at him, stepping forward to pass him the soap. He has to press close to Neville to reach it, his arm stretching over Neville’s chest. He’s warm and smells faintly of leather, and  
Neville sways a little further closer on instinct. 

“What are you doing here?” Charlie asks, while Neville finishes washing his hands. “You here for Ron and Harry?” 

Neville explains briefly about the garden, and Charlie listens attentively, smiling slightly through Neville’s nervous mumbling. He likes to think he’s gotten more confident over the past few years, this last one in particular, but something about Charlie makes him revert back to his old self. 

“You don’t have to be nervous, Neville. I promise I don’t bite,” Charlie says. He looks comfortable, in a pair of long jeans and a shirt, and Neville shifts a bit to get a good look at him. There’s something warm and friendly in his expression, and Neville finds himself relaxing slightly. There’s just a little part of him that’s intimidated by people like Charlie, people who look at home with themselves, people he doesn’t know very well. 

“Sorry,” Neville says. “I’m not very good with new people. Or any people, really. I prefer plants, if I’m honest.”

He smiles to show he’s joking, and Charlie laughs. He has a deep laugh, but it’s soft at the same time, and Neville leans into the sound slightly. 

“That’s alright. I prefer dragons, if I’m honest.” He winks, and Neville grins back. 

“We should go and get some pie before Ron eats it all,” Charlie says. Neville’s seen Ron eat; he knows there’s a real threat in those words, so he nods and follows Charlie out into the garden. He ends up sandwiched between Charlie and Harry, opposite Mrs Weasley, who keeps reaching over to pile more potatoes onto Neville’s plate. Neville finds himself nervously pushing the second portion around his plate; he’s always been conscious of how much he eats in front of other people. He feels like people are silently judging him for eating more than his fair share of food, taking in his body and making smart remarks inside their heads. It’s ludicrous, but he can’t help but worry about it. 

But Mrs Weasley is insistent, and Neville really is hungry after working in the garden, so he eats a few platefuls and takes one home with him, wrapped in cling-film. He fire-calls his grandmother, checks on his Mimbulus Mimbletonia and then falls face-first into bed with a smile on his lips. 

*

The weeks pass easily enough, and soon enough, three months have gone by since Neville first moved. Charlie’s gone back to Romania, with promises to send an owl every now and again, and Neville’s not heartbroken, exactly, but he thought there might have been something there. The Weasley’s garden is finished, spic-and-span and flourishing with new life, and Neville has an application sitting on his bedside table to work at Hogwarts, under Professor Sprout. 

Neville also has a few problems. His favourite sweater has grown too tight around his tummy, his kitchen sink keeps leaking, the store down the road stopped selling the bath salts he likes, and his friends keep demanding to meet him for cake and coffee next week, even though he’s supposed to be cutting back to save money.

Oh, and there’s a boy haunting him.

It’s not every day. But most days, when Neville gets home, there’s a boy sitting on his kitchen counter, or lounging on his sofa, or browsing Neville’s small collection of books by the window. Nothing weird happens when he appears, or when he leaves. There are no moving objects or spinning heads or bursting through the walls. It’s not a regular haunting. 

Neville’s not even sure the boy is a ghost. He doesn’t look shadowy or transparent. He doesn’t float several inches off the ground, and his head doesn’t spontaneously detach from his neck. He doesn’t moan or rattle any chains. He’s nothing like the ghosts at Hogwarts, but there is something about him that reminds Neville of Hogwarts. 

He looks pretty normal. Straight up pretty, if Neville is being honest, with the soft brown hair and the deep dark eyes. Maybe a little too broody for Neville’s tastes. And there’s the fact that Neville doesn’t actually know his name. Plus, there’s the whole possibly-dead thing. 

Neville should be nervous, unsure. He should want nothing to do with this strange ghost-boy, but there’s nothing threatening about him. He’s slim and he never has a wand with him, not even a shadow of one, and if he can do magic, he hasn’t aimed it at Neville. He’s just a boy that seems to like Neville’s house.

“You should really call your landlord.”

Neville is kneeling in a pool of hot water, holding a wrench in one hand and his wand in the other, when ghost-boy shows up. He flits into view between one moment and another, perfectly opaque and put together. His hair is carefully coiffed and he’s wearing black slacks and a crisp white shirt, the top button unhooked. He looks colourful, even in monochrome. 

“The landlady is on holiday, and I never learnt any spells to fix a sink. Reparo isn’t working.”

Neville stares into the cupboard under the sink. The strange, unfamiliar innards of the sink stare hopelessly back at him. 

Ghost-boy walks silently to stand behind Neville, leaning down to peer over his shoulder. His breath hits the side of Neville’s cheek, and some part of Neville registers that as strange. “Did you figure out what’s wrong with it?”

“Yeah.” Neville pokes the wrench cautiously in the direction of one of the pipes. “There’s a leak.”

Ghost-boy laughs softly. Neville jerks his head around – he hasn’t heard him laugh before. It’s quite a nice sound. Neville wants to collect it. 

He has Luna’s laugh in a jam jar on top of the fridge; it’s a light, airy sound, like tinkling bells. Ginny’s laugh is tucked in a matchbox in the drawer of the coffee table – that sound is bright, fierce, kind. Ron, Harry and Hermione’s laughs are tangled together in a jewellery box at the back of Neville’s wardrobe, a mixture of giggles and boisterous snorts and dry chuckles. He’s supposed to go to Dean and Seamus’s next week to pick up theirs, and he has no idea what he’s going to keep it in. 

Charlie gave him his laugh before he left for Romania, a week ago. He also gave him a kiss, and Neville didn’t need to collect that. He knows he won’t forget it anytime soon. 

“You have an odd look on your face.”

Neville has never been very good at rearranging his face on command. His face does what it wants, looks the way it likes to look. Ginny can wear any face she wants, any expression she desires, at the click of her fingers. She likes to borrow them, people’s expressions, and copy them, and then give them back. Sometimes she borrows Neville’s frown and doesn’t let him have to back for a week, and he walks around feeling lighter than ever. It’s magic that she’s never told anyone about, apart from Luna and Neville, and Neville thinks it has something to do with her first year, and a boy and a diary, and he doesn’t ask. 

Still, he tries to change the odd look. He twists his lips, and ghost-boy shakes his head. 

“I never said odd was a bad thing. Your sink is still leaking.”

“I’ll call a friend,” Neville says, sighing as he abandons his quest, standing up and grimacing in dismay at the soaked patches of his jeans. The heavy water drags them down past the bulge of his hips, and he hitches them back up, smoothing his jumper over the roundness of his tummy. He hopes ghost-boy doesn’t see. Even better, he hopes he doesn’t care. 

When he turns back, ghost-boy is gone. Neville’s shoulders drop in disappointment. Usually, he stays longer than that. Never just for minutes at a time. Neville mumbles to himself as he makes the call, and then he waits by the door for Padma to show up. Occasionally, he throws a towel on the ever-growing lake that’s supposed to be his kitchen. 

“I see you’ve decided on an indoor pool,” Padma says, when she arrives. She’s all business, in a sharp navy pantsuit and a pair of chunky, black heels. Click-click-click, go her shoes across the wet floor. Tut-tut-tut, goes her tongue, as she surveys the cupboard under the sink. 

“Can you fix it?” Neville wrings his hands as he waits. 

“I can fix anything,” Padma says. She doesn’t bother to shed her blazer, simply arches her wrist and begins to move it through the air. Her fingers move like liquid, each digit flowing and arching and bending gracefully. The dance of a hand. 

The leak slows, and then stops. 

Padma stands with grace and poise, bustling over to kiss Neville’s cheek before she leaves. She has a meeting, you see, and she can’t hang around to watch Neville mop, and the only reason that she was here at all was because Parvati would be annoyed if Padma didn’t help her friend. Besides, there was that time that their grandmother’s secret recipe caught fire during one of Parvati’s experiments, and Neville was able to recreate it, due to having collected it the week before. 

Padma says all of this in one long rush as she leaves, and Neville waves her out the door with a smile. Padma is a strange one, classy and clever, with a hint of ruthless energy that used to frighten Neville. She used to stare at him sternly, lecture him on the importance of keeping his collections private and hidden, and dismiss him at the wave of a hand. Now, she does all of that and pats him on the cheek every now and again, to display her fondness. Neville honestly doesn’t know how they became friends, if you could even call it that – it has something to do with Parvati, a bottle of champagne, and a game involving Lavender’s bra, but the details are foggy. 

Neville hopes the details stay that way. 

He shuts the door and peers around his house, but there’s no sign of ghost-boy. He’s always strangely fidgety when it comes to other people, so Neville’s not surprised that he disappeared, but still. He would have liked for him to stay awhile, maybe chat a bit, or read. 

Maybe it’s odd, but Neville misses him when he’s not around. 

*

“I brought you something new. It’s obscure, which I know you like. Daddy found the recipe in a book of strange bakes, and I thought you might like to try it.”

Luna glides over with a cupcake in her hand, and she slides it across the table into Neville’s waiting hands. Flavours are his second favourite thing to collect, and this one looks promising. Ginny is across from him at the round table, trying on the newest customer’s face – an elderly woman with a cascade of wrinkles down her papery face and faux fur scarf – and she pauses to wink at Neville before he takes a bite. 

“Huckleberry raspberry marshmallow cupcakes,” Luna says happily, and Neville grins around his mouthful. He already has all the flavours collected separately, but combined, they create a whole new avalanche of taste. 

The Cake Palace is a new investment of Luna’s dad, who passed the Quibbler on to Luna after the war ended and started up his own business instead. It’s become a regular haunt for the three of them. 

“It’s delicious, Luna,” Neville says, and Luna beams at him. She settles herself into the chair between him and Ginny, crossing her ankles and humming faintly under her breath. There’s a smear of frosting on the back of her hand, and a wooden spoon poked through the twist of her hair to keep it in place. 

Ginny shifts her face back to normal, freckles blooming one by one across her skin, and props her chin up on her hand, watching him. Neville busies himself with another bite of cupcake, not particularly fond of that expression. 

“Something’s going on with you,” Ginny says, shrewd as ever. “We haven’t said anything for weeks, but I want to know what it is.” 

Luna nods in agreement, although her eyes are fixed on something through the cake shop window. 

“It’s nothing bad,” Neville hedges, putting the cupcake down. “Really. It’s just a haunting.”

Ginny’s eyebrows fly up to her hairline. “A haunting? Seriously?”

Neville stares at her in confusion as the surprised silence stretches. 

“She was expecting you to tell us you had a boyfriend,” Luna explains. “Or a girlfriend. Or a friend who is neither or both.”

Ginny flaps a hand at her, and Luna misunderstands, or maybe doesn’t, taking it out of the air and tangling their fingers together with a soft smile. Ginny stares at her for a beat, her ears turning red, and then she clears her throat and faces Neville. Neville notices with amusement that their hands stay joined on top of the table. 

“Why did you think I had someone?”

“I just thought you looked happier, that’s all.” Ginny shrugs, pulling a face that Neville recognises as Ron’s disgruntled expression. “And you had this sappy, glowy look about you most of the time, so I figured it was either a crush or you had a secret relationship.”

“She was hoping you would say it was Charlie,” Luna says. Neville blushes, squirming slightly in his seat, and begins to pick at the tablecloth. 

“It was just one kiss,” Neville says. “And I think Charlie prefers things the way they are.”

Ginny sinks down in her seat, displeased but begrudgingly accepting. 

“It could still be a crush,” Luna points out, picking Neville’s cupcake up and licking a bit of the marshmallow whip off the top. Ginny cycles through several expressions before she settles on one she likes, and then she leans over the table with a slight leer. He leans away. 

“Do you like this person who’s haunting you?”

“I don’t even know his name,” Neville protests. “He just keeps appearing in my house and making himself at home.”

“Maybe he likes you, then.”

Neville sputters – that’s impossible. 

Luna hums, furrowing her brow slightly as she takes an absent-minded bite out of the cupcake. Neville watches her lick her lips and hears a small, avid sigh from across the table. 

“Do we know that he’s a ghost? There are lots of things he could be, you know, in this world.” She sits up straight suddenly, her wide eyes growing even larger and rounder, like bright moons in her pale face. “Or maybe he’s from a different world.”

Neville lets Ginny take the lead with that one. He settles back against the chair and watches the two of them toss possibilities around. 

Maybe he should be a little more worried about this stranger who keeps popping in and out of Neville’s life, but he can’t deny that he enjoys the company. Ghost-boy doesn’t seem to mind Neville’s, either. 

*

“Theo.”

Neville tucks his blanket further around his toes, glancing up at ghost-boy. He’s been sat on the windowsill for about twenty minutes, watching Neville with a strangely curious expression while Neville reads. 

“I know we haven’t properly been introduced, but you know that my name’s Neville. I’ve seen you reading my mail.”

It was a letter from Charlie, and Neville had walked in on him leaning over it, lips pursed, and eyes crinkled in disappointment. He’s still not sure why. 

“I never opened it,” ghost-boy says lightly, wiggling his fingers pointedly. “And I was talking about me. My name is Theo.”

Neville carefully pulls the cover of his book closed. He’s aware of how big he looks under Theo’s stare, swamped in a large green jumper and enclosed in a threadbare blanket. Before he grew comfortable with himself, he might have felt the need to draw himself in, to suck in his stomach and straighten up and push his chin out. Before, he might have felt a bit like a blob, oozing over the armchair, overflowing and spilling out of his clothes. 

Now, he just feels comfortable. Contented and relaxed, warm from the tea that’s steadily cooling on the side, and unafraid of the way his tummy pushes at the confines of his jeans, or the way his chin doubles when he lets it drop to read his book. He looks soft and he knows it, and the thoughts about how he looks don’t bother him as much as before. 

“Theo,” Neville says. “It’s nice to meet you, I guess.”

“There’s no need to be sappy about it. I just thought I’d make it official.” Theo slips off the windowsill and walks towards him. His smart dress shoes make no sound on the hardwood floor, nor on the multi-coloured rug that Neville got from a charity shop. He’s wearing a silvery waistcoat that catches the light from the window. Neville holds his breath as Theo lowers himself cautiously onto the arm of Neville’s chair and points at the book. 

“It’s about different water-plants,” Neville explains. 

“Read to me.”

“I always read to you,” Neville says, because he does. He spends hours sitting and reading aloud, and sometimes Theo’s there when he starts, and sometimes he pops in during Neville’s reading, and sometimes Neville does it on purpose, to smooth the crease between Theo’s eyebrows. “Why don’t you read to me, instead?”

Theo aims a droll look at him before sliding down until he’s in Neville’s lap. Neville jolts, and then freezes. It’s not unwanted contact, but it is unexpected, because Theo is solid. Warm and solid, a little shaky around the edges, but there. Neville utters a small, shocked sound, and Theo pauses with his hand outstretched, inches from the book. 

“What is it?” Theo’s face up close is smudgy. His form shivers slightly as he peers at Neville. There is something there, something familiar about him, but no matter how hard Neville tries, he can’t recognise him. 

“You’re not dead,” Neville stutters out. “You feel real, but you look different, up close. But you’re not dead.”

Theo stiffens, slipping smoothly out of Neville’s lap and standing in front of him. He looks smaller, somehow, folded in on himself, and Neville doesn’t like that. He moves to stand up, but Theo is already disappearing. 

*

Neville rearranges the cacti on the windowsill. His watering can floats up to meet him, and Neville busies himself with adding just the right amount of water to each plant as he peruses the application form in front of him. He’s had ample opportunities to send it off, but he can’t help but wonder if it’s the right decision for him. 

For now, he’s working in the flower store down the road. It’s a Muggle store, so the currency is different, and the plants are a little less interesting than the ones he usually deals with, but it’s nice. The hours are easy enough, and the pay is okay, and he likes helping people choose which flowers to get for their loved ones. 

But it’s not quite the same as Hogwarts, and the warmth of the greenhouse, and the sound of children rushing through the halls, and Professor Sprout’s dulcet tones; a big part of Neville aches to go home. 

“I think it’s a good idea,” Theo says. His voice appears before his body does, and Neville doesn’t jump; he’s used to this, and he welcomes the company. There’s an unspoken agreement that they won’t discuss what has Theo running scared, so Neville simply lifts his watering can in greeting and goes back to the application. 

“You obviously enjoyed being at Hogwarts, and you excelled at Herbology,” Theo adds. “I think this would be good for you.”

Neville half-turns. “How do you know that?”

Theo doesn’t speak, merely hums and gestures to the nearest succulent. “That one’s looking a little dry.”

Neville dutifully waters the plant. “Are you just going to watch me do my chores all day?”

“Happily,” Theo murmurs. Neville glances up, blushing slightly, and smiles softly at Theo, who looks immediately, like he can’t handle the sight of Neville’s smile. Neville doesn’t pretend to understand, but he lets him be, pottering around and doing his washing and the dishes and cleaning the bathroom. Theo follows him, making odd comments and occasionally wondering off. At one point, Neville hears music in the living room, and he decides not to question how Theo made it work. 

There are a lot of things he wouldn’t question for Theo. 

*

It takes a few days before Neville sees Theo again, and this time, it’s entirely unexpected. He’s standing in front of his bedroom mirror, trying to get his favourite jumper to sit comfortably around his waist, when he spots Theo in the reflection. 

“You look good,” Theo says, as a way of greeting. 

Neville agrees. He does look good; the jeans emphasise the shape of his legs just right and hug his thick thighs perfectly. It’s just the jumper that doesn’t sit right with him. It’s not that it doesn’t look good, stretched tight over all the soft curves, it’s just that it feels uncomfortably tight. 

Neville strips it off unthinkingly, leaving him in just a white t-shirt. He had been afraid to wear white, before, because people said that it made him look even bigger, but now he doesn’t see why that’s such a bad thing. Plus, this shirt has clusters of purple flowers along the hems of the sleeves, and it makes Neville feel pretty. 

Theo makes a sharp noise behind him and settles on the edge of the bed. Neville watches him in the reflection. He’s afraid that if he turns, even just for a moment, if he loses sight of Theo for the barest hint of a second, then Theo will vanish. It’s not ideal, this strange longing that’s slowly made itself known, because Neville feels a little lost when his house is empty, and he doesn’t like that. He doesn’t like relying on anyone but himself to feel whole. 

He spent a long time worrying about what others thought of him. He spent years in school enduring the jeering and mocking of his classmates, and the bullying only got worse as he grew older; people just found subtler ways of enforcing it. He worried too much, he relied too much on other people to shape his opinions of himself, and he can’t have that. Not again. He just can’t. He’s come too far to let himself stumble now. 

“I do look good,” Neville says, with a small smile. He half-turns, enough to still see Theo and reach for the nearest cardigan. “Are you going to disappear if I ask you some questions?”

Theo grows rigid, and then deflates. His mouth does something strange, becomes unyielding and firm while the rest of him slackens. 

“What exactly do you want to know?”

There’s lots of things that Neville wants to know. He wants to know what Theo is, who he is, and how he found Neville in the first place. He wants to know why he’s so close-lipped about all of this. But he has a feeling that he won’t get those answers until Theo’s ready to spill. 

“I want to know why you keep coming back here,” Neville says quietly. 

Theo blushes slightly, just the apples of his cheeks, and Neville stares, slightly taken aback. 

“I would think that was obvious,” Theo says stiffly. He rubs his temple and sighs when Neville doesn’t say anything, and then he stands and strides over until he’s standing beside Neville’s shoulder. They’re the same height, so Neville can stare straight into his eyes, but he finds his gaze wandering instead to the way the edges of his form blur as he draws closer. 

“You quiet me,” Theo says. “You make things softer, and easier to deal with. I find it hard to… interact with others, and the outside world. My friend, he calls me a recluse, but I’ve found things easier, with you. I like you, Neville. I would quite happily spend the rest of my life just watching you watering your plants.”

Neville hasn’t quite grown out of his tendency to blush like a tomato yet. He sucks in a breath and shifts closer to Theo, until his hand brushes Theo’s arm. Theo shivers, and he wonders if anyone ever touches Theo, if he’s often alone, and why. Why, why, why?

“My house feels empty without you in it,” Neville offers. “I don’t know if that’s the same thing, but I’m not sure I want to give more of myself to someone I barely know, someone who won’t give anything in return. I don’t even know your last name, and I definitely don’t know what you are.”

Theo twitches. His hands move up to run through his hair, and then he sighs, in one short, explosive burst. 

“Alright,” Theo says. “Just, wait here? Just for a minute.”

Neville nods, and Theo vanishes. Neville’s hand falls away, and he swallows, waiting in the silence. He fiddles with the edge of his sleeve as he pulls on his cardigan and tucks his feet into his slippers. He’s supposed to be meeting his grandmother. He has about ten minutes before he has to leave, but Theo asked him to wait, and so Neville’s going to wait. 

He’s three minutes in when there’s a faint knock on his front door. 

Neville holds his breath, and then lets it out slowly. There are dozens of people that it could be, from neighbours, to friends, to strangers looking for directions. He tries not to get his hopes up as he walks through the house and opens the front door. 

Theo stares at him blankly from the front porch, a hint of nervousness in his expression. 

Theo Nott. 

Neville doesn’t have anything to say. He looks solid, much more real in the glare of sunlight bathing Neville’s porch, warming the wooden beams. He looks almost regal, with his shoulders pulled back like he’s bracing for a hit, and his chin tipped up like he’s ready to fend off any nasty words. But Neville was never the one who bullied and tormented, Neville wasn’t the one who swanned around Hogwarts like he owned it, like he was better than everyone else there. 

“I won’t beg you to speak,” Theo says, after a moment. “But this is why I didn’t want to let you see who I was.”

“How did you keep it a secret? Why didn’t I recognise you?”

Theo hesitates. “It’s called Astral Projection. Not many witches and wizards can do it, but I’ve learnt, over the past few months. It’s where you send your astral body – the ghost-like form you’ve been seeing – out of your physical body and take control of it. Part of the magic is that nobody recognises me when I’m in that form.”

Neville grips the door handle and swallows thickly. “I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

Theo takes a step backwards, onto the porch, and Neville reluctantly follows him. They lean against the railing, and Neville waves to his neighbours. The sunlight is warm and bright, at odds with the way Neville feels inside. 

“I have a lot to make up for,” Theo says quietly. “I didn’t fight in the war, against either side. That was my mistake. At school, I tried to keep my head down, and keep out of the way, but I still believed the same things that the other Slytherin’s did. And I didn’t do anything to stand against them. Those are my mistakes, and I intend to fix them.”

“Is that what this is about?” Neville asks, his heart sinking. “Atoning for things you’ve done in the past?”

Theo shakes his head adamantly. “No. The first time I ended up here, it was an accident. I live not too far from here, and I was practicing my astral projection, and I ended up in a random house, and it happened to be yours. The trouble with astral projection is, you have to really think about where you want to go, so every time afterwards, I ended up thinking of you, and I found myself here.”

“So, it was all an accident? A mistake?”

“No mistake,” Theo says. “I came to enjoy your company, and I found myself seeking you out more and more. I told you, Neville. You make me quiet, and I like you. I like everything about you.”

Theo falls quiet, and Neville stares out at the street. He can see the river in the distance, and if he turns, he’ll see the beginnings of his garden, starting the bloom. 

“Do you think, perhaps, that you might be able to return my affections?”

Neville quirks a smile. He’s never heard anyone talk quite the way that Theo talks. He likes it. He likes a lot of things about Theo, too. Slowly, he turns until he’s facing Theo, able to see the tense line of his body and the small, nervous tilt to his mouth. He doesn’t look at Neville until Neville presses a small kiss to the corner of his mouth, and then he turns, wide-eyed, to stare at him. 

“I think, perhaps, I might,” Neville says playfully. “But you have to promise to start turning up in your physical body, rather than your astral one.”

“Only if you send off your Hogwarts application,” Theo counters, with a bewildered, slightly awed smile on his face. 

Neville laughs softly. He feels warm inside now, and even warmer when Theo cautiously slides an arm around his waist, drawing closer. It’s going to take a while, he realises, before things feel natural, and they don’t feel nervous all the time. 

But he thinks it’ll be worth the wait.

**Author's Note:**

> I have like a billion more ideas for this that I want to write but it was already quite long, so I thought I'd leave it here. Thank you so much! Please leave a comment/kudos if you liked it and let me know what you thought, I'm @thealmostrhetoricalquestion on tumblr if you want to say hey :) Thanks!


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